College District Probing Gay Officer’s Harassment Claims

The Los Angeles Community College District is investigating allegations that a gay police officer at Mission College in Sylmar has been subjected to a campaign of harassment and discrimination by co-workers at various offices who learned of his sexual orientation.

Officer Anthony Rotella, who has worked at the campus since 1992, publicly leveled a range of allegations Wednesday night, telling the district’s Board of Trustees that homophobia is “not only condoned, it’s promoted” in the district.

District administrators, saying their policies flatly forbid such conduct, called it the first such formal allegations they could recall in the nation’s largest community college system. Rotella claims, however, that at least three other district police officers have filed similar complaints in recent years.

“This was not one instance,” Rotella said. “This was seven months of repeated, targeted harassment.”

District officials said that they have confirmed at least some of Rotella’s claims, but that the investigation has been complicated by the fact that some of the accused officers have leveled countercharges against Rotella.

Acting Chancellor Bonnie James said he expected action would be taken “within a few weeks,” though he declined to say what the outcome might be. James acknowledged that at least one of the officers had been the subject of a prior harassment complaint but he was unable to offer details.

“I don’t think the district under any circumstances would tolerate that kind of behavior,” James said.

Although he filed his complaint with the district in December, Rotella said in an interview Thursday that he came forward publicly this week because of his frustration at the lack of action. Trustees said his disclosures were the first they had heard of the case.

“If people have been acting this way . . . it’s despicable,” said district board member Elizabeth Garfield.

During his five-minute presentation, Rotella alleged general harassment by two fellow officers and said one police supervisor unwittingly told him he avoided hiring anyone who was gay. He said that another supervisor hindered his bid to land a Los Angeles Police Department job--by allegedly giving him a poor reference--and that he had been passed over for internal promotion.

“It’s OK to be straight in the workplace. But it’s not OK to be gay,” said Rotella, who also was upset that district officials had denied his request to wear his district police uniform during last weekend’s Gay and Lesbian Pride parade in West Hollywood. (The legal question of whether Rotella had a right to wear his uniform remains unresolved.)

Capt. Bill Stevens, head of the police unit at Mission College, confirmed that late last year Rotella began receiving a stream of sexually oriented faxes and mail at the campus including ads on penile enlargement and how to find girlfriends.

Stevens said the material arrived a couple of times a week for up to two months until Rotella filed a formal complaint with the district. The material apparently came from officers at East Los Angeles College, where Rotella had worked occasionally, Stevens said.

East Los Angeles College President Ernest Moreno did not return phone calls Thursday afternoon. But a college source familiar with the case said two officers there were believed responsible for the mailings as well as for allegedly placing a sign on Rotella’s vehicle insinuating he was gay.

The college district has an affirmative action policy that mandates equal opportunity regardless of sexual orientation, including in an employee’s treatment on the job. The state Labor Code in California also prohibits discrimination in employment based on sexual orientation.

Rotella said he has no immediate plans for legal action against the district but has begun looking for another job.